The Chalukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c44.1

c44.1

THERE is, perhaps, no part of India so full of inscribed tablets and memorial stones as the Kanarese districts. There is hardly a village that does not possess one or more; and, at the same time, there is hardly a place where they are at all cared for by the people. Very few of these slabs are now found standing upright in their original positions; for the most part, they lie about many half buried in the mud of the fields. Some have been found built, as convenient slabs, in municipal culverts, others have been used in the banks of tanks and sluices, or are laid by the water's edge to wash clothes upon; while others, again, are set up on the outskirts of the village for the cattle to rub themselves against. How many of these precious records have already perished by the neglect of man or the vicissitudes of the climate will never be known. It is mainly from these lithic grants and deeds, often demanding infinite patience in their decipherment, that the knowledge we have of the dynasties who, with their feudatory chiefs, ruled over these districts, has been gleaned. Another important source of that knowledge is the copper plate grants and charters.